1969 - 1971 Fleer Baseball Quiz Cards: Cardinals, Padres, Giants & Senators

We've finally reached the end of our team by team look at the 1969 - 1971 Fleer Baseball Quiz cards.

The St. Louis Cardinals underwent a fairly major logo change from 1969 (3 Question / Small Logo) to 1970 (2 Question) & 1971 (3 Question / Large Logo) as they got rid of the baseball background and the blue circle around the logo. The Cardinals would later go back to this logo design in 1980 with a red circle around the logo.

The San Diego Padres logo changed slightly each year with the Padre having golden skin and swinging a yellow bat in 1969, and changing to no color for the skin and a white bat for 1970 & 1971. In addition, the Padre's robe and the team name go from brown in 1969 to black in 1970 to a darker shade of brown in 1971:

The San Francisco Giants also had color changes each year as the baseball went from white in 1969 to pink in 1970 to orange in 1971:


Last but not least, we have the Washington Senators. I have no reason to believe there was no Quiz card for the Senators in 1969, but I have yet to come across a quiz card with a smaller logo. The 1970 & 1971 versions to not appear to have any differences:

Once I find a smaller logo Senators card, I will update the post to show all three variations.

This concludes my review of the many Quiz card variations from 1969 - 1971. I think this exercise has demonstrated what I've been saying about the number of variations that can be found in many Fleer releases. What appears at first to be a single set can actually be multiple sets released over a few different years with variations found in each year once you start collecting that set and finding differences.

As we will see when I get to my upcoming review of the Fleer Cloth Patches, many of these variations will show up again with the the various patch sets that were released between 1969 and 1975.

1969 - 1971 Fleer Baseball Quiz Cards: Yankees, A's, Phillies & Pirates

Next up in our team by team review of the 1969 - 1971 Fleer Baseball Quiz cards is the Yankees.

The Yankees logo had blue under the brim of the hat in 1969 (3 Question / Small Logo) which changed to white in 1970 (2 Question) and 1971 (3 Question / Large Logo). In addition, the shading on the bat is a bit different in 1969:




The Oakland A's logo changed each year. One change is pretty obvious, but can you spot the other one?

From 1969 to 1970 the baseball changed from green to white and the shape of the "A" changed a bit. Going from 1970 to 1971 there is another variation that I hadn't even noticed until I uploaded this scan for this post! Check the direction of the seams - in 1970 both move from left to right, but on the 1971 card the top seams move right to left. This is one of the reasons I find these Fleer issues so interesting - I keep coming across subtle little differences like this that I never knew existed, and as far as I know aren't cataloged anywhere.  There 1971 A's card can be found with 2 different sets of questions.

I mentioned a few days a go that the Philadelphia Phillies were one of the teams that helped me place the 3 card issues into a chronological order that made sense. The older Phillies Logo on the 3 Question / Small Logo card makes it pretty clear that this would have been the earliest issue, placing it in 1969.



The Pittsburgh Pirates cards support my theory that the 2 question cards were issued next in 1970, with the 3 Question / Large Logo cards being issued last in 1971:

The Pirates logo changes each year as in 1970 the top of the Pirate's hat goes from a yellow rim to white. In 1971 the round logo changes to a rectangular shape with the name Pirates now in the logo. Since its the logo on the right that would show up in all subsequent Fleer logo issues until 1988, this once again leads me to the conclusion that the 3 Question / Large Logo cards would have been the final issue.

We've got one more group of teams to complete our review of the Quiz cards which we'll cover tomorrow.

1969 - 1971 Fleer Baseball Quiz Cards: Brewers / Pilots, Twins, Expos & Mets

Picking up where we left off, we move on to the next team on our list which is one of the most interesting - The Milwaukee Brewers / Seattle Pilots.

I've mentioned the Pilots a number of times for various late 60's / early 70's sets with regards to using them to try to determine when a particular set was issued. Since they were only in existence for 1 year (1969), and didn't actually move to Milwaukee until the end of Spring Training in 1970, they are very helpful in developing a time line for when Fleer released certain sets.

It looks like Fleer did not have time to make changes to account for the Pilots moving in 1970 (just like Topps), which is why we find a number of Fleer issues containing the Pilots in 2 different sets. We saw this with the Iron Ons, and we will see it again with the Cloth Patches.

I think we would also see it with the Quiz Cards, but so far the elusive 3 Question / Small Logo Pilots Quiz Card has escaped me.

As we saw with the Royals yesterday, the initial Fleer Quiz Card set included the 1969 expansion teams since we have a 3 Q / Small Logo for the Royals. I have yet to find one for the Pilots, but one may exist.

However, just as we saw with the 1967 - 1968 Fleer Emblem cards, they left the Astros out for 2 years, so its possible they did not have a Pilots card in 1969.

But, since the Pilots were in the 1969 Iron On set, I'm pretty sure they would have been in the Quiz Card set that year as well. They also have 2 different Cloth Patches which I will be getting to shortly which leads me to believe there were Quiz cards for the Pilots in both 1969 & 1970.

So for now, I can show the 1970 (2 Question) Pilots card (not corrected in time to replace with the Brewers) and the 1971 (3 Question / Large Logo) Brewers card:

If I ever track down a Pilots card with the smaller logo and 3 Questions, I'll be sure to post it.


Now its time to play spot the variations with the Twins Quiz cards:

This variation is pretty easy to catch when all 3 years are laid side by side, but might be something you'd miss if you weren't looking at them together. The 1969 card has red stitching on the baseball and red sleeves and belts on the players while the 1970 and 1971 cards are done in black. In addition, the 1969 card has the players wearing blue caps while the next 2 years feature black caps.

There are 2 variations of the 1970 Twins card as it can be found with 2 different sets of questions.

We finally get to a team where I can spot no variations - The Montreal Expos! Of course I'm missing the 1969 card so there may be something I am not aware of, but then again, I'm not sure a 1969 card even exists.

Here are the 1970 and 1971 Expos cards:

Why am I not sure a 1969 Expos card exists when I just got through saying that I think a Pilots card does exist? It has to do with the 1969 Iron On set. For some reason the Expos were not included in the 1969 Iron On set, but did appear the next year. Could there have been an issue with the Expos logo? Could it possibly have not been ready when Fleer needed the design to put together the Iron Ons & Quiz Cards? In the many auctions I've followed and pictures I've saved from these auctions, I've never seen a smaller Expos logo, which leaves 3 explanations:

1) There is no Expos Quiz Card in 1969 (just like there are no Iron On)
2) There is an Expos Quiz Card with a smaller logo (like all the other teams) but I've just not found it yet
3) There is an Expos Quiz Card for 1969, but it has the exact same size logo as 1971 (in other words, there is no small logo variation)

At this point, I tend to favor explanation #1. I will continue the quest to get to the bottom of this mystery, but for now, I think with the team being left out of the Iron Ons that Fleer simply didn't have a logo to use when the sets were issued.

Finally tonight, we take a look at the Mets:

The logo changed from 1969 to 1970 with the addition of a white outline around "Mets" and white instead of blue inside the "e" and "s". The city skyline also changes from light blue to a darker blue.

The logo is the same for 1970 and 1971, but the colors are different shades as the 1970 card is more red and the 1971 card is more orange (just like we saw with the Astros).  There are variations for both the 1970 and 1971 Mets cards given they can be found with 2 different sets of questions.

If anyone reading this has either the 1969 3 Question / Small logo Pilots or Expos cards, please let me know. I'd really like to see a picture of these 2 cards as I would like to confirm they actually exist.

Check back in tomorrow for the next 4 teams in our variation review.

1969 - 1971 Fleer Baseball Quiz Cards: Tigers, Astros, Royals & Dodgers

Continuing the review of the variations for each team's 1969 - 1971 Fleer Baseball Quiz Cards, we pick back up with the Detroit Tigers.

The 1969 Quiz Card (3 Questions / Small Logo) has an older version of the Tigers logo which changed in 1970 (2 Questions) to the more familiar logo that was used from the 1970's through the 1990's:


The 1970 logo was repeated on the 1971 card (3 Questions / Large Logo) as well:



While the Houston Astros were for some reason left out of the 1967 - 1968 Fleer Emblem cards, the team did finally appear in the 1969 Quiz Card set. For the 1969 card, the logo was orange against a red background, so that you could see the round logo. For 1970 & 1971, the background matched the color of the logo so that you could no longer make out the round logo, with the 1970 card having a slightly more reddish color and the 1971 a bit more orange:

In addition, the lettering in the word "Astros" changed a bit as the letters had a white outline around them and were a brighter shade of blue.


The Kansas City Royals had almost identical logos for all 3 years, except the 1969 card had a lighter shade of blue, and the crown was also a lighter shade as well:

Other than the color change, the Royals logo was the same all three years - which makes them a bit of an exception relative to the other teams we've seen.

Finally, the Los Angeles Dodgers had a very subtle change to their logo when they went from a flat horizontal team name in the logo in 1969 to a logo with the name tilted at an angle in 1970 as well as in 1971:

 We've reached the halfway point - 12 teams down, 12 teams to go. Stay tuned for more unusual logo variations as we finish up our look back at the remaining Fleer Quiz Cards over the next few days.

1969 - 1971 Fleer Baseball Quiz Cards: Cubs, White Sox, Reds & Indians

Moving right along with our review of the 1969 - 1971 Fleer Baseball Quiz cards, here are the next 4 teams:

The Chicago Cubs logo changed slightly from 1969 (3 Question / Small Logo) to 1970 (2 Question) and even a bit more in 1971 (3 Question / Large Logo) with the "UBS" fully inside the "C" in 1969, the lettering getting larger in 1970, and then the "UBS" shifting a little to the right from the "C" in 1971 to where the "S" is right under the top and bottom opening of the "C":

This is a very good example of how you sometimes find very subtle differences in Fleer logos that aren't apparent at first glance.

Speaking of subtle changes, the Chicago White Sox logo also has a minor change from 1969 to 1970/1971. Take a look at the 3 cards below and see what is different besides the card on the left having the smaller logo:

The batter's shoes go from having the red background showing through in the 1969 card (3 Q / Small Logo) on the left to being black for the next 2 years. Otherwise, the logo remained the same.


Moving on to the Cincinnati Reds, we have more variations to spot.  Even though the Reds cards look almost identical each year, there are minor changes from year to year.

In the 1969 card with the smaller logo, Mr. Red's eyebrows are white, but change to black in 1970 and 1971.  In addition, the 1971 card has a registered trademark (R) that's been added.  There are 2 different versions of the 1971 card as they can be found with 2 sets of questions:

Finally, the Cleveland Indians also have a change, but this one is probably a bit easier to spot:


In 1969, the feather is on the right, but it switches to the left in 1970, and stays on the left in 1971 as seen below:


Boy, was I naive when I thought I only needed to track down 24 cards to complete a set of these!

More variations to come with our next installment.

1969 - 1971 Fleer Baseball Quiz Cards: Braves, Orioles, Red Sox & Angels

Today we'll look at the 1st 4 teams in our review of the 1969-1971 Fleer Baseball Quiz Cards to see the variations between the 3 years on a team by team basis.

First, from left to right for the Atlanta Braves, the 1969 (3 Question / Small Logo) card has an all white logo background, while the 1970 (2 Question) and 1971 (3 Question / Large Logo) cards have a 2 tone blue/white background:

There are actually 2 variations for the 1970 card as it can be found with 2 different sets of questions.

The Baltimore Orioles had a black circle around the Oriole Bird in 1969, followed by the orange circle logo in 1970 and 1971 which completely gets lost against an orange background.  Since the logo went from black to orange, it would have looked much better to reverse the backgrounds as well to make the background black for the 1970/1971 cards so that the orange circular logo would stand out.

There are 2 variations for both the 1970 and 1971 Orioles cards as they can be found with 2 different sets of questions.


For the Boston Red Sox, the 1969 (3 Q / Small Logo) card has a smaller logo as you can see that the circle around the baseball does not touch the top or side borders while the 1970 and 1971 cards extend to the borders. The other differences are the circle around the logo is black and the stitching on the ball is entirely red in 1969 while the 1970/1971 logos have a blue circle and blue/red stitching as we see below:

Finally tonight, we have the California Angels. The Angels logo changed each year going from a green diamond in 1969 to a white diamond in 1970, followed by the state logo in 1971:


As with some of the other teams I mentioned in yesterday's post, the Angels logo also helps in figuring out the order in which these Quiz Cards would have been issue as it confirms that the 3 Q / Large Logo cards would have had to have been issued last given that the state logo is what they used during the 1970s.

Stay tuned as we will cover another 4 teams next time.

1969 - 1971 Fleer Baseball Quiz Cards

If you've been following along with my various posts on Fleer issues, you've probably noticed I tend to keep mentioning variations. As we've seen with some other sets, Fleer tended to take an idea and run with it for a few years at a time, making subtle changes each year. At first glance, a collector might not realize that a set he is collecting actually has a number of different variations. This is exactly what happened to me when I first started collecting Fleer Quiz Cards.

Before I tell my story, first things first - what are Fleer Baseball Quiz Cards? Here's an example:

Quiz cards were produced for a number of years to provide something a bit more solid in the various packs of cloth patches that Fleer was producing around this time. Just as we saw with the 1967-1968 Fleer Emblem cards, these cards were included in packs to make the pack more firm. Since the cloth patch stickers were very flimsy, they wouldn't be strong enough to have a pack maintain its shape when it was being handled. Hence the piece of cardboard inserted in the pack to help the pack keep its shape. Rather than just inserting a blank piece of cardboard, Fleer put a number of different things on the cards over the years like the team logos and trivia questions I am currently reviewing.

One of the interesting things about the quiz cards was that they were never mentioned on any of the packs. The cards I'll be covering have team logos, and another series of quiz cards had stadium pictures, but neither of these had any type of mention on the packaging.

I had seen the Quiz Cards mentioned in a few places over the years, but had never actually seen any. Eventually I came across a few auctions, and started picking them up. At first I figured all I needed to do was to collect all 24 teams and I'd have a full set. However, once I got a few, I started noticing some differences.

The first difference was that some cards had 2 questions, and other cards had 3.

Then after acquiring some more cards I realized that I had two cards for a team that both had 3 questions, but the logo was different.


I then realized that there were actually 3 distinct sets!

Doing a little more research, I found out that Fleer included these cards in packs issued between 1969 and 1971. Now that I'd narrowed it down to the years they were produced, I needed to figure out which type of quiz card came from which year. Since the cards are not dated, this was going to take some work.

Thanks to the Cubs, the Pilots, and the Phillies, I have what I think is the answer to the question of which type of quiz card came from which year.

Lets start with the Cubs and the two different 3 question cards:

The first thing you will notice is that the logos are slightly different, with "UBS" completely inside the C on the left while "UBS" is sticking further out on the right. The bigger difference however, is in the size of the logo. The logo on the left is smaller than the logo on the right. The logo on the right extends all the way to the white borders around the logo while this is not the case with the logo on the left. This difference in logo sizes is found for every team.

So - now we have a way to tell the difference between the 2 different quiz cards which contain 3 questions. One set has 3 Questions / Small Logo and the other set has 3 Questions / Large Logo. In addition to the size of the logo, in many cases as we will see there is a different logo as well.

But which came first - the 3 Question / Small Logo set or the 3 Question / Large logo set?

The answer is found in Question # 1 on the Cubs Quiz cards. The Small Logo card question asks "What IS the nickname of the NEW Seattle Baseball Club?", whereas the Large Logo card asks a slightly different question: "What WAS the nickname of the Seattle Baseball Club"?

Thanks once again to the Pilots, we can determine the order in which these were issued. The 3 Question / Small Logo set had to come first since the 3 Question / Large Logo set came out after the Pilots moved to Milwaukee.

Now that we've established the order of the sets that contain 3 Questions, what about the 2 Question cards? Did they come before both 3 Question sets, after the 3 Question sets, or were they released in between?

To answer that question, we turn again to the Pilots:

Note the card on the right is the 3 Question / Large Logo card as the logo extends all the way out to the white border. Since the Pilots quiz card is a 2 question card, this proves that the 2 question card had to have been produced before the 3 Question / Large Logo variation given the Pilots became the Brewers.

So, for the final question, was the 2 Question card produced before or after the 3 Question/Small Logo variation? To solve this riddle, we turn to the Phillies:

The 3 Question/Small Logo card on the left has the old Phillies logo while the 2 Question card has the logo the Phillies started using for the 1970 season. Therefore, the 2 Question card has to fall in between the two 3 Question variations. Mystery solved!

To summarize: The 3 Question/Small Logo variation was issued in 1969 (based on the question about the Pilots on the Cubs card), followed by the 2 Question variation in 1970 (based on the change in the Phillies logo), with the final set in 1971 with 3 Questions / Large Logo (based on the change from Pilots to Brewers).


If you want to take the variation theme even further, there are some cards I have found where the questions are different for what appear to be the same set. I don't have enough of these cards to confirm that all teams have question variations or not, but at least some do.

One other thing to note - both 3 Question sets carry the line "Quiz yourself, your family, your friends", while the 2 Question card does not.

Finally, the cards are a bit shorter than the 1967-1968 Fleer Emblem cards I reviewed previously, but are still taller than a regular card. The Quiz cards are 2.5 x 4.0 inches, whereas the Emblem cards are 4.5 inches tall.

Now that I've explained how to spot the differences, over the next few days, I will post each team and their 3 Quiz card variations.

UPDATE 4/2010:

I was able to acquire a 1969 Fleer Pennants & Stamps unopened pack


which is the product that contained the 1969 quiz cards, and allows us to confirm without a doubt


that the 1969 quiz cards have 3 questions, and have the smaller logo which does not extend all the way out to the border around the logo:

You Never Forget Your First

Before I had ever seen my first Fleer cloth patch or sticker, the very first place I ever saw baseball team logos was in a comic book.

When I first started collecting baseball cards in the mid '70s, baseball cards didn't carry team logos. Topps had not put team logos on cards since 1965, and it wouldn't be until 1983 when they would show up on Fleer cards, and then the following year on the back of Topps cards. So for my first year or two of following baseball, I wasn't familiar with team logos.

At the same time I was getting started on following baseball and collecting baseball cards, I also started reading comics. For Christmas one year (probably 1975), I received some old comics from the late 60's - early 70's. A few of those comics carried an ad like this:

For a 10 year old just starting to follow baseball, this was a really great ad. While I had seen some of these logos on uniforms from my baseball card collection, many of these were new to me.
Here's a closer look at the logos:

As the Mets have "World Champ" above their logo, its pretty easy to determine this was from 1970 following the Mets World Series win in 1969.

The ad above appeared in the September 1970 issue of Green Lantern # 79. It undoubtedly appeared in many other issues as well as I remember seeing it many times in different issues, and I even remember cutting out the ad for the logos to keep with my baseball card collection.

I recently came across the ad, and seeing it reminded me that this was the first time I remember seeing all the MLB team logos in one place, so I thought I'd post it, and see if anyone else remembers the ad as well.

As for Fleer logo stickers, it wouldn't be until a year or so later that I would first come across Fleer Baseball "Grand Slam Hi-Gloss" Stickers in 1977


and get started on what 30 years later became The Fleer Sticker Project, but I'm jumping ahead a bit. I'll cover these in due time as I've still got much to cover from the early to mid '70s first.

Just for fun, the first reader to identify which team is missing from the T-shirt offer will get 10 Fleer Stickers of their favorite team (excluding any teams that joined the league after Fleer stopped producing stickers in 1992). The first person to leave their comments with the correct answer is the winner!

1969 Fleer Baseball Pennants and Stamps

As we keep rolling along through the late 60's / early 70's Fleer issues, the next oddball item on our list is the 1969 Fleer Baseball Pennants and Stamps:




As with all the Fleer releases from around this time frame, the wrapper has a 1968 copyright, but that date pertains to the copyrights for the logos and not the year the issue was released.

This set is from 1969 given that the Seattle Pilots make an appearance as well as the other 1969 expansion teams such as the Royals, while the Phillies are still sporting their pre-1970 logos (meaning these couldn't have come from 1970). Apparently however, the Expos were not included. The Expos do not appear in any of Fleer's various 1969 releases, but finally appeared in 1970.

Each pack contained a sheet of stamps that would contain a large team pennant, a large team logo, a team cap, and 7 smaller stamps on the right side of the sheet as shown below:

This is the only picture I've seen for these in the form of the complete sheets that you would have found in a pack. It is a very colorful release, and gave kids a number of different team logos on each sheet.

If we assume every team had a pennant (except the Expos), that would mean there would have been 23 different sheets. However, there are also AL & NL pennants, so it looks like there were 25 different sheets.

These were packaged with a quiz card, even though the packs don't mention them. Given the packs would have been very flimsy without something a bit more sturdy like a thin piece of cardboard, Fleer included a quiz card in the pack to provide a solid backing. In case you are wondering what I mean by quiz card, here is an example:


I will be getting to the various quiz cards that Fleer issued in future posts.

At least one kid saved the loose stamps that had been removed from the sheet as one auction had the following loose stamps:





Given that these aren't cards, most kids wouldn't think about saving a complete sheet of stamps - they'd likely remove the stamps and stick them. While plenty of the cloth stickers from around this time still survive today and can be found pretty easily (because even though they were stickers, they were also standard card size and possibly more likely to be treated and saved like cards), this release seems to be somewhat obscure - probably both due to limited demand for this release when it came out (Fleer didn't do a second series), and due to the nature of the release itself (perforated stamps), this is a rarely seen item.

As you can see, Fleer was really trying to get their moneys worth out of their license to use MLB logos. In 1969 alone, so far we've seen 3D trophy plaques, Iron Ons, and now Pennants & Stamps. If Fleer couldn't produce player cards, they were at least trying many different ways to attract some of kids baseball card spending money.

UPDATE 12/2009:

Here is the Pilots Pennant sheet that 1969PilotsFan mentioned in the comments below. Thanks Sean!


UPDATE 4/2010:

I was able to acquire an unopened pack from Fleer collector Barry

and have done a post on opening the pack

which yielded this great sheet: